


A jubilee, but no jubilation.

by TayBartlett9000



Category: British Royalty RPF, Historical RPF, The Crown (TV)
Genre: 1977, Family, Future, Gen, Great Britain, Harold Wilson (mentioned), Historical, History, Hope, Jubilee - Freeform, Monarch - Freeform, Politics, Prince Charles (mentioned), Princess Anne (mentioned), Princess Margaret (mentioned) - Freeform, Queen - Freeform, Queen's POV, Royalty, Silver Jubilee, The Crown, Winstan Churchill (mentioned), kingdom - Freeform, reflections, royal, set at the end of season three, short fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-14
Updated: 2020-11-14
Packaged: 2021-03-10 05:54:56
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,394
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27549442
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TayBartlett9000/pseuds/TayBartlett9000
Summary: The queen  endures her silver jubilee, marking twenty five years  on the throne. She cannot help but dwell upon the bleakness of the past twenty five years but even through her sad reflections, she   still has hope  for the future.
Kudos: 5





	A jubilee, but no jubilation.

I have been given over to increasing periods of ever more despondent self reflection of late, but on this day I feel that said despondency of reflection has reached its darkest point. 

The crowds are cheering, cheering for me as if I have achieved feets of grateness. For them, this day is a celebration. They will be cheering me on all day I suppose but as the carriage pulls me on, I am unable to feel the same level of joy. How could I when I know more than anyone else what the past twenty five years have truly been like, how little I have achieved? The crowds do not see it but I do. I know the truth about this jubilee day. The truth for me is far from glorious, a long way from triumphant. Indeed, there is nothing to celebrate for me. But I have to do it. I have no choice. And I have to do this alone. It seems that the queen is always alone. I wish it was not so, but it is. Nothing one can do about it. I will of course endure as I have done these past twenty five years. As Margaret said, we must always endure. 

I ask myself, in the time I have been on the throne, what have I actually achieved? It is a question that I have been asking myself an awful lot of late and I still haven’t yet found a satisfactory answer. Maybe there is no answer. I know one thing though. I believe that I have in fact achieved very little. This country was still great when I came to the throne. My dear father, God rest his soul, had pulled this great nation through the second world war by doing a job that he never wanted to do. Things may have been hard but my father managed to pull us through almost insurmountable strife in order to ensure that Britain remained great. All that has happened on my watch is that things have fallen apart. The people lining the streets right now cannot see it. But I can. Margaret is wrong. I reflect upon what she told me before I set off. “It has only fallen apart if we say it has.” She is wrong. Our job may be to offer hope to the nation in times of trouble, to offer the people a light in the darkness, so to speak. But it is a foolish thing to deny the truth when it is confronting one. I know the truth.

When I first placed the crown upon my head twenty five years ago, I had high hopes. Back then, I had dear Winstan to guide me. His sound mind and iron will supported me when I had very little hope and so I clung to it, almost like a child clings to her father. I was a young queen learning the role she had been thrust into but thanks to dear old Winstan, I managed to learn the skills I needed to bear the burden that like my father, I had been most unsuited to.

And then Winstan stepped down. And from there, everything seemed to go wrong. The empire was crumbling around my feet and I could do nothing but watch as we faught to maintain control of it. But Eden I realised, was not a man to be trusted. He wasn’t only a less than companionable sort, he was also a man capable of making very dangerous decisions. I had known that his plan to maintain our colonial grip on Egypt would fail but I had been powerless to stop him. It had failed just as I had predicted and as a result, Eden was thrown out of office and he was replaced with Harold Mcmillon, the man who was almost as stealy and dull as Edward Heath.

I had always known that the cordial partnership between a monarch and the current prime minister was important. My father always stressed the point and though he had been unsure of Winstan at first, he had learned to trust him as I had. And so I had tried my upmost to do the same. Liking Mr Mcmillon had been incredibly hard to do however but I had percisted, glad beyond measure when he too left the prime ministerial post. I was glad to see him go, I cannot lie.

I wonder what the future will bring for me. I remember telling Harold Wilson when first we met that one never knew what destiny had in store for one. I never expected to be queen. He had never expected to be prime minister. He had told me so himself. But the both of us had made of our destinies what we could. He was popular, popular enough for the people to vote him in twice. The people loved him, as they seem to love me. I wonder if Mr Wilson ever questioned his decisions as I have often done my own? I suppose that he has. I’m certain that all leaders must question their ability to lead at some point in their lives. But he had convinced me that I was doing the right thing when I had questioned my decisions most. When I failed the people of Aberfan, he had reassured me though I deserved no reassurance. I had taken comfort in Mr Wilson’s reassurances, although I knew why he had done it. Everyone around me saw it as their job to heap praize upon my head. They seem to find difficulty in being critical of any decision I make. I know it is meant to reassure and yet, their constant praize makes me question my decisions with greater frequency. 

It has been a very difficult twenty five years. I can only hope that the future is brighter. I have no idea who will take Mr Wilson’s place. I can only hope that he is as good a companion as Mr Wilson was but of course I do not know.

Nor do I know what the future holds for my family. I know that I need not worry about Anne. She is married now and that should keep her busy and happy for a good while yet. Philip and I have learned to find happiness in our marriage. Our aniversery had brought yet more reflection, though this had been a happier state of reflection than most of my other reflections have been. So I do not need to worry about Anne. It is Charles who I am worrying most about. He loved Camilla. I could see it. I suspect that he does still love Camilla. I had hated tearing the two apart. He loves Camilla as I loved Philip it seems and we had forced the two apart. I wonder what the future holds for Charles now that Camilla is married. He will have to find himself a wife First though, I think he will have to find himself. He seems to have lost himself along the way I think. I’m worried about him. I cannot deny it. I am deeply worried about Charles. 

My country. My family. Both seem to be falling apart. I need to find some way of keeping them both together. It is imperitive that I hold everything together. As Margaret told me, holding things together is our job. We paper over the cracks. The queen goes on. In that, Margaret was right. It is our job to paper over the cracks. I can only hope that in doing that, I will somehow succeed in sealing those cracks, healing the great rift in my family and assisting the next prime minister in creating a brighter future for this great country of which I am queen. It is going to be a difficult task indeed. I know that. I know not yet whether such a thing can be achieved. I can only hope it can. If I can achieve that, I know that the next time a jubilee celebration come around, I will be able to take it in my stride with a considerably lighter heart. It is always darkest before the dawn, my father once told me. I can only hope to God that said saying is accurate. It has been a bleak twenty five years. It can only get better from here, surely. 

**Author's Note:**

> I am so excited for the fourth season of the crown. Can't wait till tomorrow. I'm sure that the queen's relationship with Princess Diana and Margaret Thatcher will give me a lot more to write about but for now, this is an interpretation of what the queen may have been thinking about on the day of her silver jubilee.


End file.
